JAY JOSHI
Monsoon it seems, isn’t the same as it was before. No. we’re not talking about climate change or all the other serious issues; we’re referring to how life during the monsoons has changed over the years, and many chores that people had to do to prepare for the season, are slowly disappearing, apart from some rural pockets.
With increasing urbanisation and changing lifestyle, a number of traditional monsoon chores are giving way to cheaper, and more convenient alternatives, but certain traditions, skill sets, and a part of heritage is also being lost. TG Life spoke to a number of people from Goa to understand the change.
“In the earlier days, a number of people had mud cow-sheds which had roofs made from wood and thatched with grass. Repairing these roofs by replacing the timber or grass if needed was an important task to be done before the remains hit.” says Chaitanya Malik, a farmer from Pernem who is also into animal husbandry. “Now, we just use aluminium sheets for roofing. Sometimes cow sheds are built from cement, or prefabricated frames are available. So, cow sheds with thatched roofs are certainly passe.”
Similarly, people are increasingly preferring houses with cement roofs, and the traditional clay tiles, or ‘nale’ are now becoming rare. “Clay tiles on top of the houses had to be cleaned before monsoon so that water could flow down smoothly.” mussed Ganesh Shetkar, a villager from Keri-Sattari “Earlier, the village was self-sufficient, and all things needed for pre-monsoon work were available in the village itself. I come from a family of potters, and during my father’s lifetime, we too used to manufacture clay tiles needed for roofing. Later, Manglorean tiles became more popular. Now, many houses have cement roofs, or people prefer aluminium sheets because they are cheaper and easier to install than clay tiles.” he informed.
FInding a labour to fix the clay tiles is also a Herculean challenge, said Shetkar, noting that even as far as a decade ago, a labourer was available for around Rs 200 a day, but now the price has gone up to Rs 500 a day. Secondly, labourers who repair traditional clay-tiled roofs are now hard to find, and tiles too cost around Rs 12 apiece, making the job an expensive affair in terms of time as well as money.
One more thing that made monsoon rather exciting season was the availability of delicacies such as mango and jackfruit ‘saat’, papads, dried kokum, pickles and what not. These were made in almost every household. They are around still, but are now mostly brought from the market. Shridha Assoldekar Shetye from Merces however, strongly opposes buying these things from outside.
“It is an important tradition that we need to preserve for future generations.” says Shetye. “Earlier, everyone had a house, and a porch where trees such as mango or jackfruit would be planted, and thus these fruits would be easily available, and material could be put out in the front yard for drying.Now, we do not have that luxury of space. Also earlier, ladies had time to invest in such activities. Now, career makes it hard to take the time. Even so, we must strive to keep it alive. Every individual has a taste of their own hand, there is a joy in the process of making traditional delicacies, and we must keep that taste and joy alive.” says Shetye who uses the space on the terrace of her residential society to dry kokum and other ingredients needed for traditional recipes.
Because of convenience, or due to negligence, many of our traditional ways of life are being lost, and while we do welcome the positive changes, we should not change so much that we forget where we came from.
